She Won't Cry
by I hart Booth
Summary: After a notsomessy breaking up, Brennan needs to center herself, so she goes to the lab. After an evening with Booth, she needs to find clarity. But tomorrow...is endless. songfic, oneshot BB!


**So this popped into my head a while back and I finally got it typed, hope you like it, cuz we all know I love it since it's a songfic. yay! lol. ok, this is Big Girls Don't Cry by Fergie**

The darkness was thick, insects who had been silenced with the setting of the sun sat gazing as the stars glowed overhead. It was far too late to have been doing anything other than sleeping, or getting ready to sleep, and yet she was there.

**The smell of your skin lingers on me now  
You're probably on your flight back to your home town**

She bent over the clean white skeleton and squinted in concentration. The lab was empty, her only company was the silence and the thoughts moving about in her head.

_Angela would probably say working till all hours of the night is no way to handle a messy breakup._ She thought absently as she picked up a bone to examine it more closely, using the same delicate care alone in the lab at night as she did during the day when all eyes were on her. _But nothing Mark and I ever did was messy._

**I need some shelter of my own protection baby  
To be with myself and center, clarity  
Peace, Serenity**

With a sigh, she set aside the bone and made a quick note on her notepad.

To the security guard in the lobby, to the cameras in the Medico-Legal Lab, even to you and me she seemed fine. Normal. She was working dillegently, perhaps a bit obsessively, she walked and spoke into her tape recorder confidently.

But normal was definitely not the case.

**I hope you know, I hope you know  
That this has nothing to do with you  
It's personal, myself and I**

It was obvious in the way she was leaning slightly on the exam table and allowing herself to indulge in a the comfort of being shoeless, that she was not normal. Her thick auburn hair, which had flowed so freely earlier that morning, was now pulled back in a messy bun. Her eyes red and her face sans makeup because after getting caught in the downpour coming in from her car earlier that evening, she hadn't cared to put more on.

The dark circles under her eyes and the hunch of her back told the story of a long day behind her and a long night ahead. But the spark in her eyes shown with nothing except determination and strength. She would not be beat by this.

**We've got some straightenin' out to do  
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket  
But I've got to get a move on with my life  
It's time to be a big girl now**

She had honestly thought maybe somehow this time, Mark would be different. He didn't patronize her, or bug her about long hours. He seemed to understand her need for a steady, perhaps a bit overloaded, work schedule.

Of course, she soon found out that the reason for that was because he had a few other blonde, leggy things with whom to occupy the time when she wasn't around. She had been his trophy girl, something to brag about at parties and bars.

_Hey, I'm banging that famous author_.

And ironically enough, that hurt more than it made her angry. Anger, she knew, would come tomorrow with the light of day, but tonight…tonight it mostly just hurt.

**And big girls don't cry  
Don't cry  
Don't cry  
Don't cry**

He watched her from the shadows, and as usual it made him feel a little guilty, like he was a voyeur or Peeping Tom, watching her when she thought she was alone. But he couldn't help it. Her undeniable, unconscious beauty was something he'd never seen matched, he felt the need to drink it up as often as possible.

Finally, his conscience got the better of him and he stepped quietly out of the shadows and walked toward the platform, waiting until she saw him.

**  
The path that I'm walking  
I must go alone**

She lifted her eyes, but the rest of her body remained bent over her bones.

She managed a small smile, but neither spoke a word.

He looked good, his black and purple striped tie was loose, the top few buttons of his dress shirt were undone and his sleeves rolled up to the elbows. He tilted his head to the side, one hand in his pocket, the other holding his jacket slung over his shoulder, and raised one eyebrow. Waiting.

She sighed and stood to her full height, hands on her hips, imitating his challenging smirk and raised eyebrow.

From where the security guard sat, watching the interaction over the camera feed, he smiled. Even he, who barely knew the doctor and the agent except by reputation, could tell there was an entire conversation happening on a level far beyond that of spoken words. Or perhaps an argument, because by the way the woman's expression suddenly changed from challenging to glaring, and she pursed her lips as she gathered her bones into the box, it looked as though she had lost.

**I must take the baby steps 'til I'm full grown, full grown  
Fairytales don't always have a happy ending, do they?  
And I foresee the dark ahead if I stay**

Booth watched her as she gathered her things. He could see the red rims of her eyes, he knew that jerk had hurt her, and if he got half a chance he would make him pay for that.

He caught her elbow as she stalked out of her office, now minus a lab coat and plus a purse, and he pulled her to his chest, abandoning all pretense of 'just partners' and wrapping her in 'friends and maybe more'. He saw her hurting, and he wanted to help, if not stop the pain altogether.

Brennan hardly struggled at all. She'd foreseen the embrace in the careful way he watched her as she shut things down, and to be honest, would have been a bit disappointed if it hadn't come.

**Like the little school mate in the school yard  
We'll play jacks and uno cards  
I'll be your best friend and you'll be my Valentine**

He took her to the diner, and wordlessly, they shared a piece of pie. It wasn't until the coffee came and the last of the patrons began to leave that the first words passed between them.

She spoke, he responded, and she smiled. Another short back and forth and both were chuckling quietly, studying their coffee more than drinking it and ignoring the waitresses as they set up the chairs and mopped around them.

She wasn't ready to leave yet, and he wasn't going to make her.

**Yes you can hold my hand if you want to  
'Cause I want to hold yours too**

Neither knew when, or where it happened, perhaps when she dropped her napkin, and he picked it up for her. It could have been she had a bit of cherry pie on the corner of her mouth and he reached over, gently cupping her chin and wiping it away. It may have even been when he paid for the meal and she didn't protest.

But whenever or however it happened, when they left the diner and walked down the street toward his SUV, her hand was tucked safe and warm inside his, and neither seemed to mind.

In fact, if the matching small, secretive smiles on their faces were any indication, both were quite aware of the subtle shift in their relationship, and both were feeling butterflies of anticipation for what it would mean in the morning.

**We'll be playmates and lovers and share our secret worlds  
But it's time for me to go home**

The car ride was quiet. He didn't need directions to find his way back to her apartment, and she was exhausted, emotionally, physically, even mentally.

Without asking, he got out and followed her upstairs to her door. He stuck his hands in his pockets, shifted from foot to foot and studied a small crack in the drywall ceiling while she awkwardly fidgeted with her keys.

After several long, silent moments of endless monologue in her head and growing impatient with his squirming, she frowned and pushed her key into the lock.

**It's getting late, dark outside**

"Goodnight Booth." She said quietly, opening the door just enough to slip through. But as she started to shut it, it wouldn't move. She held her breath and opened the door again to meet his gaze.

It turned out to be a good thing that she was holding her breath, because the look of smoldering fire in his eyes coupled with the pure amazement on his lips was literally taking her breath away, and she steadied herself against he doorframe when her knees turned to jelly.

Even as he stepped closer and that sweet, musky smell she found herself inhaling deeply whenever he was near surrounded her, she knew she shouldn't.

She knew thoughts like 'we're partners' and 'I don't like Booth that way' should be running through her mind. She should be pushing him away, wondering what he was doing, make him stop.

But she didn't. She already knew what he was doing and she didn't want to push him away and she ceritainly didn't want him to stop. For once in her life her walls were down and all she knew for sure was that his lips were getting dangerously close to hers. But, God, she didn't want him to stop.

Booth's eyes flickered between her lips, parted and waiting, almost trembling with anticipation, and her eyes, blue crystal orbs, helpless with want.

He dipped his head, taking her chin with his finger and tipping it so he could place a tender, gentle kiss on the corner of her mouth. After a short, skin melting pause, he moved to brush his lips softly across hers, and pulled away before she could react.

"See you tomorrow Temperance."

His hot breath brushed her ear and she opened her eyes when she sensed he'd moved away, not even aware that she'd ever closed them.

She watched him walk away down the hall, and ducked inside her apartment when he started to turn and look back at her.

Grinning madly, she shut the door and leaned against it for support as she turned the lock.

**I need to be with myself and center, clarity  
Peace, Serenity**

Tomorrow held endless possibilities. There would undoubtedly be anger when she remembered her betrayal and she would mourn as she collected the pieces of her heart that she'd managed to entrust to Mark.

But there would also be joy and excitement while she tentatively, rationally and excitedly explored the possibility of a new relationship with the one man who'd never let her down or broken her trust. The one who'd always been right in front of her.

She smiled as she meandered back to her bedroom and changed into warm, soft pajamas. And there on her pillow, where she had expected to allow salty tears to fall, she turned and smiled at the sky.

**Tell me what you thought. It was my first try at an omnipotent 3rd person POV so I'm eager to know what you thought.**


End file.
